The Victor Frankl 5-a-day Book Club

You know how I’ve been banging on about Victor Frankl’s book Man’s Search for Meaning? Well, I’m going to bang on about it a little more. Okay, a lot more.

I realised that the book is 140 pages long, and the main thrust of the narrative is only 84 pages. That’s an incredibly short book and it punches well above its weight.

Then I thought: 84 is the product of 3 and 28. 140 is the product of 5 and 28. This cannot be a coincidence: this means you can read the full text in any calendar month by reading five pages a day. If that’s too much for your busy schedule, you can read the main narrative with just three pages a day.

Then I thought: this sounds like the start of A CULT. I’ve always fancied starting a cult, maybe this is my chance!

Or maybe it’s just a chance for me to read five pages of Frankl a day for four weeks and to reflect on what a megalomaniac I’ve become.

So in the spirit of my Idea, I would hereby like to announce the start of THIS ISN’T A CULT REALLY THIS IS JUST A BOOK CLUB month.

I’d like to post something on my blog every day, but realistically that’s not going to happen. What will happen are sporadic updates from my reading, which I shall also link you to in these emails throughout the month of May. Aren’t you lucky!

If you’d like to join me in this reading, I’d be delighted to hear from you. Find me in the comments down there.

For the time being, I’ll leave you with a quotation from Victor Frankl’s preface to the 1992 edition of my new favourite book:

‘[S]uccess, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one’s dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one’s surrender to a person other than oneself.’